


Brave Enough

by kangelique



Series: The Captain Swan Playlist [4]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: "How many times do I gotta tell you love Im a survivor", At least i think its fluffy, Captain Swan affection because yesssssss, Cute, Emma actually admits what we all wanted to hear, F/M, Fluffy, Gen, Itty Bit of Angst, Killian does the eyebrow thing, Kissing, Love Confessions, Magic Mishaps, Peaceful, Season 4 episode 23, Some Humor, Some song lyrics literally in her sentences, Sort of deleted scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-15 00:37:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,510
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19284502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kangelique/pseuds/kangelique
Summary: Emma actually admits her love for Killian (yeah, that's basically the overall purpose of this) and you get the more content version of their 'I Love You'.





	Brave Enough

**Author's Note:**

> Oof, I'm kinda bad at summary's. This one shot itself though is for you to judge (my attempts at writing something happy, or kind of happy), hope you like it!

**Brave Enough:**

 

The author's pen had been in Henry's hand. He'd dipped the tip with Regina's blood-stained fingers. He'd opened the book, and she had pushed Issac back roughly when he'd come running forward, all alarm in his eyes and distress in his hands when he tried to reach for her son. " _Henry, do it!"_ she'd shouted. And the words had glowed a beautiful light blue on the page that reminded her of Killian's eyes as Henry said, " _Thanks to the hero Regina's sacrifice, Issac's villainous work was undone_." She'd glanced down at the word 'Sacrifice' and she was sure she'd stopped breathing in the second it took Henry to finish the sentence with a definitive period and then a bright, white light erupt from the book.

 

Emma's eyes slowly opened to a cloudy sky - _Storybrooke's sky,_ she realized in her haze as she began to sit up and the grey beanie clutched tightly in her right hand spoke of the lingering Autumn chill. Not the Enchanted Forest's summer heat.

 

"Mom!"

 

"Henry," she breathed in relief with a slight hoarseness to her voice, her throat having apparently closed up on her as threw his arms around her neck and she quickly bent her knees without a second thought to throw her arms around his back and hug him back just as tightly. Blue eyes and black hair and  _Is she worth your life, pirate?_ flashed through her mind, and her eyes snapped open. "Hook."

 

_Killian._

 

Emma's blonde hair was flying behind her as she took off running down Main Street, her boots hitting the road as fast as she could. The Apprentice was just getting up, and Robin had just collided into Regina's body, all strong arms encasing her, and smiles so wide with relief and happiness that their teeth actually showed. Emma pushed herself, rounding the familiar corner, the high ringing in her ears and her own panicked voice as she cried out " _No!"_ at the same time the sword went right through his back, being the only thing she could focus on as she took the stairs up to her parent's loft two at a time.

 

"Where is he?" Emma opened the door and stumbled inside, eyes wide and lips parted in heavy breathing. "Where's...Hook?" She faltered for a second, her mind swirling with his real name and the kisses they'd had under the moonlight, the few nights they'd spent aboard the Jolly Roger, rocked to sleep by both his warm arms and the gentle crash of the ocean's waves against the ship's sides, and her deepest fears spilled when he simply sat down next to her and entwined their fingers together. All that couldn't just be  _gone._ The man she loved - _loves-_ couldn't just be  _gone._

 

She glanced almost pleadingly to her mom and dad for answers, any answer.

 

"He was there," David pointed to the small kitchen alcove, her eyes following his finger to the brown storybook and Henry's latest homework assignment on the floor. "Right before we got dragged away." 

 

Emma began walking forward, gaze intent on the storybook and the space where Killian should be, glassy eyes starting to jump around everywhere when the space revealed only the same empty air, and  _he isn't here._ "Everyone reappeared where they were before before this whole mess started," she said and stopped, her eyebrows lowering and her eyes falling to the floor. "No," she exhaled quietly.  _No,_ this couldn't be how it ended. How  _they_ ended. Their story, their baby step milestones, Neverland, and going with her to the ends of the earth or time. He can't have died not remembering who she was, he-

 

"Yeah, sorry about the mess," All three heads snapped up to him leaning against the railing upstairs. "I really needed to find that book, and I'm usually a bit tidier." He did the eyebrow thing -the same eyebrow she'd pressed her lips to one time when he'd made her laugh, and they were alone at the sheriff's station and no one would know that she'd placed the most tender of kisses on Killian Jones, the pirate she'd promised herself she wouldn't fall for- and turned his smile on her. Emma's face broke into a grin and she took off for the stairs with purpose.

 

"Killian," Emma breathed and threw herself at him like a fifteen year old girl with her first boyfriend, one arm catching him around the neck and the other arm going around his back while his right arm encircled her waist. They rocked gently from side to side, her smile buried against his black-leather covered shoulder, and as she tightened her arms around him with a sharp inhale, she felt his body sway back and hers forward and suddenly they were falling onto the flowery bedspread, and she still hadn't opened her eyes.

 

"Woah!" Killian laughed and she giggled -actually  _giggled_ \- into his neck and then jumped back up, shaking the hair out of her face to reveal the wide smile and leaning forward to entangle his fingers with hers, pressing their joined hands right beside his head into the mattress. He looked up at her, a mixture of surprise, amused, happiness, and  _earnest_   finally settling in his blue, blue eyes when he said, "How many times do I have to tell you, love, I'm a survivor," he reminded her. 

 

Emma licked her lips and he continued, "Look, I didn't mean to cause any panic. I woke moments before your parents and came up here looking for your boy."

 

"He's fine, Henry's fine," she rushed over the words, nodding her head and eyes flitting everywhere on his face, trying to take it all in again. His lips, his cerulean depths, those expressive eyebrows, the small scar on his right cheek that she'd once brushed her thumb over. Everything she had been afraid she would never see again. Everything Emma thought she'd lost. "I just...glad you are too," Emma breathed and sighed. She kept gazing down at him and he let her, only moving his head slightly when she sighed again -this time there was no doubting the utter relief in her small exhale and the hint of regret somewhere underneath the surface.

 

"What is it?" Killian said curiously. 

 

Emma blinked rapidly a few times -for a second she really thought she was going to cry and Killian's gaze was already there, staring up at her and appearing ready, always ready, to catch however many tears that fell- and briefly looked down at his chest before she closed her eyes as if gathering her strength and straightened up, pulling him up with her. 

 

The moment he came up to face her, placing one strong hand flat on her thigh as she settled herself to sit more comfortably on his lap and then lowered her head a few inches, eyes closing on their own accord as her hand came up to grip the lapel of his jacket - a reminiscence to Neverland- is when a white cloud of smoke suddenly enveloped their space with a  _whoosh!_ and he was engulfed from her view. Emma's eyes snapped open and her hands immediately reached out, the solidness of his lap disappearing from under her, and when she turned her head in confusion, the smoke cleared and she wasn't even allowed a second to register where she was when she slipped and fell backwards into cold water.

 

Water rushed into her mouth and burned her nostrils. Emma shook her head, forcing her body up as her feet kicked down and her arms broke apart through the blue in a sloppy arc. She caught a glimpse of black hair out of the corner of her eye before her head popped up on the surface with a gasp. Almost three seconds later, Killian's head popped up next to her coughing, and she instantly turned and moved to clutch his shoulders gently.

 

Her cheeks suddenly grew red with realization and she ducked her head, forgetting that her hair couldn't curtain her from his curiously raised eyebrow because it was decidedly wet and sticking to her neck and the back of her red leather jacket. "I'm sorry, that was my fault," Emma murmured and bit her lower lip in that way Killian insisted was a tell just like his scratching behind the ear was when she looked up at him. "I was still thinking of your eyes, and then...that just sort of happened," she tried to shrug it off, but she only blushed harder.

 

Killian chuckled softly and let the pull of the waves draw him closer until she felt the distinct feeling of the curve of his hook brush her hip and then the sharp point settle gently at the base of her spine. "The docks, love?"

 

Emma just nodded. "It kinda read my mind and transported us from blue to blue, or whatever."  


 

She wouldn't admit that her magic had taken them here because it was where Killian always brought her when she was mad or sad or as he put it:  _When your heart is uneasy, Swan._ She wouldn't admit that she loved sitting between his legs with her back against his chest, and the whole town so calm and quiet when she sneaked out of the loft at five in the morning so they could watch the sunrise together. She also wouldn't admit that she thought about the docks as their spot, where they had divulged bits and pieces of their past, where her defenses came down and all there was wrapped in his arms was a vulnerable Emma Swan.

 

She didn't need to. He knew.

 

"Or whatever." Killian smirked and his arm suddenly went around her waist under the water, holding her tightly and pressing her body against his chest so that when he ducked his head and her lips met his halfway, both their eyes fell closed in the slow and languid way he began to kiss her. "You were going to say something, Swan," he said in a hushed tone when he tilted his head back and tore his lips from hers softly, prolonging the kiss when his bottom lip caught her upper lip, and Emma would really never get tired of kissing Killian Jones.

 

"Yeah...yeah, I was," Emma sighed and pressed her forehead to his. She clenched her eyes shut for a moment, preparing herself, as all the while she ran her thumb over his wet lips. He pursed his lips into her skin and planted a small peck on the pad of her thumb. Emma smiled and was unable to resist cupping his cheek to give him a sweet kiss that was all too short. She pulled back regretfully, and when she opened her eyes, his baby blues were there waiting patiently. She took a deep breath and whispered quietly, "When I...watched you die. I was...there's some things I should have said. I was too afraid. It was just so hard to let you know."

 

"Let me know what?" Killian said quietly and raised an expectant eyebrow. He knew. Of course he knew. And the nod of his head and encouraging smile he kept firmly on his face even as she glanced down quickly and then met the deep pools of his eyes again made the corners of her own mouth go up- the hesitance slowly draining out of her the more he continued to gaze at her like she wasn't broken, like he couldn't quite believe she was in front of him and centering herself by grabbing onto his shoulders, fingers curling around his neck like a 'O' as another wave lightly pushed her forward, and his lips brushed her forehead.

 

"What we had - _have-_ was- _is_ \- beautiful," Emma stuttered, and she almost expelled out a loud groan for how pathetic she was going about this. He was the eloquent one with words, not her. She shook her head,  _come on, Emma, say it,_ and huffed quietly in frustation,  _he wants to hear it, you want to hear it, just say it already!_ Emma finally sighed and licked her lips nervously, faintly tasting the slightest hint of the ever-present rum. "I didn't want to wreck it all," she admitted sadly. "This good thing we have, I mean. Every day I would have thought about the truth, and I think...the hardest part is we never would have known if we were meant to last. I want us to last, Killian," Her hands left his neck to grip the lapels of his jacket tightly. 

 

"You needn't fear we won't, Swan. So as long as I'm here, I intend to stay," he promised.

 

Emma laughed a watery laugh -the way she did when so much sadness had been squeezing her heart at seeing the life leak slowly from his eyes in the spur of a moment- and mumbled, "I know," against his jaw. A hand came up to bury his fingers into her mess of thick, soaked curls, and she pulled back to look up at him. "You stripped away the walls I built, like no one ever has," she said softly. He gazed down at her with his heart in his eyes, and Emma smiled.

 

She was happy, she was feeling good and-

 

"I love you," she confessed in a rush of words. Then she closed her eyes and took a deep breath and said it again, this time more slow so the words weren't lost to the wind and small ripples of the water. "I love you."

 

A smile slowly took up his face until it became an all out grin. "I love you too, Emma," Killian whispered, and there was  _meaning_ and  _truth_ in his silky voice, and the way he looked at her like he adored her -every part of her, even the ugly parts-and something in the way his blue eyes had instantly lit up that made her pull him down to fuse her mouth to his and capture his lips again again in a passionate kiss that drew out longer with every scrape of his teeth and sweep of his tongue over her bottom lip. The arm around her waist tightened just a bit while her fingers explored the many paths that started at the nape of his neck. He tilted his head to the side and deepened the kiss, and when her eyes fluttered open, she was sure they were dazed over in his smell and proximity.

 

"I wish I was brave enough to love you," she panted when they finally broke apart for air, and she could hear her own guilt in her voice because they'd been so dangerously close to losing this. _Losing him._ And her heart still sped up, and her eyes blinked a little more than once, and she still looked away sometimes because she still wasn't good at admitting such a loaded thing.

 

Killian placed a small kiss on the tip of her nose. "You already are."

 

Maybe he was right.

 

Maybe she was getting there.

 

And third time was the charm.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> -Thanks for reading!
> 
> -Song is: Brave enough  
> By: Lindsey Stirling
> 
> -I said it before on my previous one shot -I think, part 1?-that I take request for songs to add to the playlist. Any song that you associate with Emma and Killian, or that makes you think of them, and etc...BUT YEAH, if you've got a song you would like me to write about, as well as any idea to go with that song, then feel free to leave it in the comments.
> 
> -And as always, thoughts are welcome!


End file.
